Travel Tip of the Week

Erica Johns
Aug 21, 2017
5 min read

Getting from A to B

Transport

There are a number of way to travel around the world these days, but we have our own personal favourites, that you can either choose to take or leave our advice below.

Interrailing - We were looking into all the different ways in which to travel around Europe, but we kept coming back to the same one over and over again. Interrailing was by far the cheapest and easiest method of travelling around Europe. You can get a train from pretty much any city to the next, with next to no hassle whatsoever. Trying to find flights or even looking up your own trains is just a nightmare, give it a try and see for yourself. Whereas interrail, you choose your age range and the length of time you wish to travel and that's about it... you can pair your tickets up, so like us we booked a global monthly pass but as we wanted to go for more than a month we booked 2.

The only thing you must do when you are travelling around is to remember to fill in the times/dates and destination of your trips, if you don't you can get into trouble with the train guards, as you have a limited amount of journeys you can take, depending on the type of ticket you have purchased. So you MUST remember to carry a pen with you at all times.

There is an app called Rail planner, which allows you to view trains all across Europe and also to book reservations - we highly recommend you do this for overnight trains yourself because language barriers at train stations can sometimes be an issue... Funny story, we queued up at a train station in Berlin, to book seat reservations for our train to Krakow, and we thought this went very smoothly, until we got onto the train to find our cabin. We entered the carriage in which our tickets stated and a very rude man began shouting in German at us. We couldn't understand a word in which he was saying, and advised him we did not speak German, he was just pointing at our tickets and shouting, so we knew something was up. We went back out to find another guard in hope that someone would speak English to help us find out the issue, it turned out that the woman at the train station had actually booked us in as two female tickets, meaning that Charlie could not sleep in the same cabin as me. We complained and we did manage to be placed in our own private first class cabin, so we obviously weren't complaining by then end of the journey, but you may not get as lucky as we did... so we definitely advise either getting a phrase book and learning the basic language or booking the reservations yourself.

Public Transport - Be wise, we found in most countries, there are very few places in which to purchase your tickets and then we noticed the locals just appear to hop on and off trams and buses, even the drivers didn't question this. So we advise you watch the locals and copy their actions, for a sneaky travel tip.

However, not all places are so easy, so just like you would if you are travelling in your own country, by a day pass if you know you will be hopping on and off trains/buses all day. Or simply, use the gift you were given from birth, your legs. Walk, why not? Look up your destination and follow directions using the app, Maps.me. It's a great app, all you need to do is download the country map before you lose wifi and then you can use if offline! You will notice gradually how fit you are getting, as the weeks go by, you will be able to walk longer and you will save a lot of money in the mean time! A 4km walk, will soon feel like a breeze, you just have to get through some achy muscles in the process.

Skyscanner - This is a search engine that allows you to travel to wherever in the world that you desire to visit, it compares millions of flights to find you the cheapest deal, fast. Whether you want to travel around Asia or head to New York to see Times Square light up for New Years Eve, they will find you the lowest cost flight to get you there. There are so many websites nowadays, when you just want to book a holiday, but when you go to checkout, all of a sudden you are bombarded with extra fees that you aren't even sure what you are being charged for. Well with Skyscanner, there are no hidden charges or added fees, they'll link you directly to the airline or travel agent when you go to book your purchase.

We personally love this website, even if you aren't sure of where you want to go to, you can set your destination to Flexible, Everywhere upon your search bar. As you can see below, you can not only search your destination vaguely, you can also set your departure and return to either the "cheapest month" across the year or if you can't be as flexible with your dates, you can set for a specific month, to enable you to see what part of the month is the cheapest time for you to go.

Book your flights today or if you want a little extra help on how to refine your search to get the best out of the website, view our post on Skyscanner here.

Kayak - Kayak, similar to Skyscanner, it's a search engine, searching hundreds of other travel sites at once to get you the information you need to make the right decisions on who to go with for your holiday. This website also allows you to have a much broader search, just like Skyscanner, so you can search "any month" or even "anywhere", this feature allows you to have such a wider search if you are unsure on where to have your next holiday. Be spontaneous, be broad, and you may find yourself on a holiday you never thought you would be on!

Below is an example of a search you can do through Kayak, and as you can see below, you can also search hotels, cars or even a package; flights and hotel! Click on the link below and book your next holiday today!

City Mapper - If you are a travelholic but you find yourself lost within how to get from A-B within your chosen city, then download the app Citymapper today and you will not regret your actions! This app has saved us from many lost moments around cities all across Europe, however there are many other destinations it can help you with, from Hong Kong to Singapore, the list is huge... It provides you with public transport in the area to take you to your desired destination from the quickest/slowest route, whichever you choose in your filters. It will even provide you with walking directions if preferred. Below is a list of just some of the destinations they offer.

Never get lost within a city again, with Citymapper!